A very important thing to consider when shading is the material of the thing that you're making a skin of. Different materials reflect light differently, with rough things like dirt and hair reflecting light less than smooth things like metal and plastic. A general rule is that the smoother something is, the shinier it is.

So, consider material when you shade!

I also like to utilise some light dithering to help convey a rough surface, especially fluffly fur, as seen above.

skin file:


Also, when shading sleeves, I like to use some dithering on the sides to imply folds.

skin file:


I put little shadows at the top of the legs, because if there was a light source above the skin, the arms would cast a shadow down, onto the legs. I don't have the shadow go down the entire leg, though, as that wouldn't make sense when the leg sticks out.

male and females have differences, but don't make the differences too prominent or you'll get banned

skin file:



skin file:


What's that? Your skin isn't naked? Well, use similar shading, but with less or more contrast, to show what material the body is, if it isn't skin.

skin file:


This method can also be applied to very short hair to a certain extent, as short hair doesn't change the shade of a hair very much. Just use less contrast to imply a furrier texture than skin.

Getting hair to look good is difficult. Just try to simplify the hair into chunks, and shade those. idk


the hair on my skins of Cloud and Corrin, because i like how they came out:

no one really knows

Eye colour is optional! You can leave irises black if you want.

There's also this 'realistic' method of doing faces, which looks pretty cool from the front. I used to do something similar. However, I don't do it anymore, as it looks very weird when you look at a face like that from the side.

I mostly use #3 myself, but I used to use #2 a lot.

<-- the bottom row ones involve putting the lighter bits on the hat layer

As explained in the 'Eyes' section, there's also this 'realistic' method of doing faces, which looks pretty cool from the front. I used to do something similar. However, I don't do it anymore, as
it looks very weird when you look at a face like that from the side.